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By Nat Hentoff $18.15
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 TalkMediaNews (CC-BY)
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Looks like that request President Obama made, in last month’s State of the Union address, to send him a bill to sign that would restrict members of Congress from taking financial liberties in their own investment activities wasn’t just a passing reference to score points with the public. Above, Rep. Eric Cantor.
Posted on Feb 9, 2012
2 COMMENTS
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 AP / Paul Sakuma
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Since his death last year, we’ve heard plenty of lionizing and denigrating takes on Steve Jobs and his challenging leadership style, but we can now add the FBI’s character sketch of the late Apple founder, circa the George H.W. Bush era, to that mix.
Posted on Feb 9, 2012
1 COMMENT
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 AP / Seth Perlman
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It’s one of the most maligned domestic relics of the George W. Bush era, and now President Obama has stepped in to let 10 states off the hook, at least for the time being, from the experiment in educational standardization known as “No Child Left Behind.”
Posted on Feb 9, 2012
1 COMMENT
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 AP / Cliff Owen
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On Thursday, state and federal government representatives announced that five major banks—Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Ally Financial, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase—had agreed to pay their part in a settlement of more than $25 billion stemming from the mortgage market meltdown that caused millions of Americans to lose their homes.
Posted on Feb 9, 2012
9 COMMENTS
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 codepinkphoenix (CC-BY)
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A Washington Post poll found that 83 percent of Americans approved of the U.S. government’s use of flying robots to kill terror suspects overseas, while 65 percent found no fault even if those targeted were American citizens. Liberals and Democrats consented to the killings as well, with favorable showings of 55 percent and 58 percent, respectively.
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 AP / Elaine Thompson
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Washington became the seventh state to enter into the distinguished company of those that recognize the right of gays and lesbians to marry when the House passed Gov. Chris Gregoire’s same-sex marriage bill with a 55-43 vote Wednesday. Gregoire is expected to sign the bill into law within the next five days.
Posted on Feb 8, 2012
4 COMMENTS
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 State Department
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A $750 million, 104-acre complex that employs 16,000 people might have been George W. Bush’s concept of an embassy, but the people who run the country that happens to surround America’s fortress in Baghdad aren’t thrilled and the State Department has decided to scale back. (more)
Posted on Feb 8, 2012
5 COMMENTS
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 AP / Local Coordination Committees in Syria
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Bashar al-Assad’s government rained more than 200 bombs on the opposition-controlled city of Homs on Wednesday, killing an unconfirmed 27 people and demolishing homes. The Russian and Chinese governments maintained their policy of nonintervention while leaders of Western and Arab nations scrambled to decide how, if at all, to get involved.
Posted on Feb 8, 2012
6 COMMENTS
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 Leandro, (CC-BY)
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New York City’s hotels have agreed to arm housekeepers with personal panic buttons for use in emergencies, including the event of unwelcome advances from guests. The decision likely results from an increased concern for worker safety stirred up by the alleged sexual assault of a housekeeper by former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn last May.
Posted on Feb 8, 2012
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 YouTube
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John Boehner’s keen instincts have compelled him to zero in on the highly charged—and politically advantageous—dispute about religious organizations and contraception coverage that’s currently reaching the boiling point on Capitol Hill. On Wednesday, the House speaker made a special speech devoted to the topic on the floor of Congress.
Posted on Feb 8, 2012
5 COMMENTS
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 Gage Skidmore (CC-BY-SA)
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Although an easy answer to the question posed by the headline would appear to be something along the lines of nothing good, there are more subtleties to the issue that merit exploration, and Rick Santorum’s triple win Tuesday doesn’t necessarily add up to an ultimate victory against GOP front-runner Mitt Romney.
Posted on Feb 8, 2012
2 COMMENTS
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 M.V. Jantzen (CC-BY)
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The U.S. government and energy companies have been fiddling with ways to get at gas trapped inside rock underground for decades. Now, using highly pressurized toxic liquid to extract the petro-bubbly is becoming standard practice, even as evidence mounts that it poisons drinking water. ProPublica charts government and industry’s decades-long regulatory dance.
Posted on Feb 8, 2012
1 COMMENT
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 AP / Chris Carlson
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The former senator from Pennsylvania swept ahead of Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich, who have been hogging the campaign airtime, Tuesday night to claim victories in Missouri, Minnesota and Colorado.
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 White House / Pete Souza
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In the brief interview he gave NBC before the Super Bowl, President Obama declared, “I’ve been very clear that we’re going to do everything we can to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and creating an arms race, a nuclear arms race, in a volatile region.” Sounds like a very laudable goal, right? Except for the fact that the nuclear arms race in the Middle East is already under way.
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 Flickr / 401K (CC-BY-SA)
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Newt Gingrich has his. Stephen Colbert has one too. And guess what? So does President Barack Obama. We’re talking about those giant, democracy-gobbling super PACs, and this election season, everybody who’s anybody has one.
Posted on Feb 7, 2012
1 COMMENT
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